Snow and Blood
by Bryher
Summary: Oneshot from 'Forsaken'. Isola takes a walk after the first snowfall.


Title: Snow and Blood

Rating: T

Summary: Isola takes a walk after the first snowfall.

Author's Note: This is a small oneshot linked to Forsaken, which is six chapters and about to grow. I think I'm back!

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The air was calm in comparison to the violence of before. Icy white flakes drifted in the gentle wind and melted against the pink skin of her cheeks that were flushed with the cold.

Feeling a small hand sneak into hers, Isola looked down. Tiberius shivered and tucked himself into her side, trying to snuggle under her cloak. Looking back out over the wall, Isola let the boy wriggle into the heavy folds, feeling the shivering of his skinny frame.

"What will they do with them all?" he whispered, pulling at her hand. Isola said nothing for a long moment, idly picking some dried blood from her hair.

"They'll be buried in a big pit," she said eventually. "The Woads will, anyway. They might burn some of the Romans."

"And Geraint?" There was something quavery in the child's voice, a note of upset and a need for reassurance.

Isola looked at the boy again, and noted the tearstained face and bloodied hands. "How did you get blood on you?" she asked quietly, taking his hands in her own and studying them.

Tiberius looked down, pulling his hands from hers and trying to stop his chin wobbling. "I hid under a dead man," he whispered tearfully. "I didn't know what else to do."

"I left you with that Roman healer in the infirmary," Isola said blankly. "What were you doing outside?"

"I _was_ in the infirmary," Tiberius wailed, tears now freely falling. "The Woads came in and killed the Roman man. A man in the corner was already dead, so I pulled him on top of me to h-hide." On the last word, the little boy's voice broke, and he covered his face with his hands, quiet sobs wracking his small frame.

Isola pulled off the cloak, revealing her bloodstained clothes and gashed knees. Wrapping him up, she bodily lifted him and began to make her way down the stairs, sidestepping the faceless corpse of a Woad on the way down.

The first snowfall had brought with it an unexpected attack on the fort. Woads, clearly hungry and fighting for the grain stores, had attacked the fort in the middle of the night. As Isola picked her way along a street with Tiberius in her arms, she noted the slushy mud that seemed too red in places to be the heavy clay that was sometimes found in the hills.

Villagers huddled in shop doorways while infantry soldiers worked in teams to clear the dead. It had been a heavy loss for the Romans.

Ducking into the doorway that led up into her rooms, Isola's thoughts turned to Geraint. Only a young man, he had arrived from the Sarmatian contingent at Segedunum. Cut down before he'd even had a chance to settle at the fort by a Woad barely old enough to shave. Kicking the door open to her room, Isola stopped.

Tristan stood at the window, looking out onto the square. Turning, he raised an eyebrow at the boy in her arms.

"Explain," Isola said flatly.

Tristan shrugged.

"Came to see if you were still alive," he muttered tonelessly. He looked back out of the window as a cry came from below. Isola already knew the tone of that cry and didn't move. She'd seen enough widowed women in her lifetime, and was the cause of too much of that grief already to want to bear witness to another's misery.

"Disappointed?" she asked mulishly, setting the boy down. Tiberius scooted onto the bed, pulling the cloak around him tightly and sniffing miserably.

Tristan shrugged again. "What happened to him?" he asked, nodding at the raggedy bundle of child on the bed.

Isola shook her head. "How about you get me some hot water and cloths, and then maybe I'll explain over some of Vanora's stew?"

Tristan nodded, making his way to the door. Turning her back, she went to Tiberius, stroking snow-damp hair from his forehead.

She ignored the softly spoken declaration from the door, waiting until the footsteps receded down the corridor before glancing over her shoulder with a troubled frown.

Tiberius leant into her hand, his face pale and tired. "What's he not disappointed about?" he asked softly.

"Shh," Isola murmured. "Nothing at all."

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